The Last Seven Days

Well, I know it's been a long while since we last spoke, but I'm not going to fill in the gap - I'm back at uni, it's second year, it counts, I'm busy, blah blah blah - I'm just going to tell you about my last 168(ish) hours.

24 hours in

I bought a Patriots cap - aren't I cool?

Last Sunday, Sam and I went down to London to see the Patriots play the Rams at Wembley stadium. It was such an amazing atmosphere - before we even got to Wembley. For those of you who aren't/don't have boyfriends that are into American sport - the Patriots are an American Football team. One NFL (National Football League) game is played each year in London (it's actually going to be two from next year, but that's probably unnecessary information...), so we were super lucky that our (read: Sam's) team was playing in London this year. So London streets and tube stations are full of European NFL fans, all wearing the jersey of whatever team they happen to support, all sharing a look of solidarity over their shared passion for a sport played on the wrong side of the Atlantic.
The game was so much fun, Train played, there were (fairly unimpressive) cheerleaders, there were fireworks - however no ticker tape, seriously gutted about the lack of mini, shiny paper squares. I got over it though, because the Patriots won 45-7 - sorry Rams!
Also on Sunday, a brand new University Radio York show, called The Blurb, aired. I was on it - yey! I'm going to link you, but you need to be aware that I have never recorded for radio before and I clearly need to practise my radio voice - (press shift and) click here.

48 hours in
Dedicated student that I am, I spent £50 to get a peak time train ticket from Leicester to York to get back in time for my Monday morning lecture... and I slept through my alarm. The inconceivable expense of on-the-day train fares left me no choice but to spend an extra day in Leicester (half price food at the Slug and Lettuce on Mondays) and get a train to York on Tuesday, resulting in me missing two lectures and a film screening and putting me seriously behind on work right at the start of the week. I don't really want to talk any more about Monday... or Tuesday.

96 hours in
So, I came up with this format for my blog because I felt like I'd had a really good week, but I have now realised that it did get a little dry in the middle... Wednesday was mostly made up of catching up on work, but I did ring my mum, brother and sister in the evening for the first time in FAR TOO LONG. Joey is working at the Natural History Museum in London at the moment, so that's pretty cool. Unfortunately, Dad was out when all the phonecalls were occurring - sorry Dad!
Ooh ooh, I just realised that Wednesday was the day that I found out I would be choreographic for the Dance Society Christmas Showcase this year - yey! I'm going to going a group dance to Regina's Spektor's 'Samson' - I'm sure I'll post a video on here some time shortly after December 8th.


120 hours in
(I'm genuinely using a calculator to add up the hours for each day... GCSE maths was a long time ago... and it's 3.43 am) Thursday nights are cell group - YEY! I cooked pasta and bolognese, with real actual meat in it! We had a really great cell, chatting about what we feel God has made each of us passionate about and supporting each other in prayer. I'm going to take this opportunity to shout out to Niall and Rob, they're two awesome G2 freshers - there are many many more, but they were the two present on Thursday.
After cell group, I had to stay up super late to continue catching up on work, although, given that my work did include watching two Left Bank, French, 1960s films I guess I can't complain too much.

144 hours in
Three hours straight of seminars looks pretty horrific on a timetable (for a BA student...) but mine were so very good this week. I don't think I've actually told you My Dear Reader Chum (a Miranda Hart reference, seriously, listen to the Blurb podcast already!) about the modules that I'm doing this term; Post-War European Cinema and The End of the Roman World. In film we were look at the French Left Bank, we chatted about the utterly incomprehensible but totally brilliant but-I-recommend-you-don't-try-and-watch-it-at-3am 'L'année derniere a Marienbad'. It's such a contrast to go from that straight into my history seminar on the writing of Gregory of Tours (a sixth century 'historian' for those of you not interested in the Late Antique period). I'll stop boring with information about my degree now.
On Friday night I did some volunteering with York Archaeological Trust, they were hosting an event with Richard Platt, whose ever so cheery book about the plague has been shortlisted for the Royal Society Young People's Book Prize. Since I'm interested in book publicity as a potential career, it was really great to be a part of - also, I got to help kids with really tenuously plague related crafts and that's always fun!

168 hours in
Brings us to now, I'm finally up-to-date with work, which is fortunate, since I need to think about starting essays this week... super. I had a good day, it wasn't majorly productive, I switched my hair back to a centre parting, replaced my ripped-beyond-acceptable jeans and volunteered at Barley Hall for the Illuminating York festival.
I've run out of steam to keep writing... I just watched two really great films, The Descendants and LOL - check them out if you get the chance.

Stay super! xx

P.S. I'm well aware that I over- and mis-use punctuation - I'm working on myself, promise.